Gap’s Spring Global Positioning

The definitive word to America on pants for spring: It’s either a skinny crop (maybe in shell-pink) or seventies flare (possibly in a kind of deep dusty-raspberry) worn with pointy high Mary Janes and a floppy blouse. This, as far as Gap’s creative director Patrick Robinson has distilled it into a globally transmittable message, is the company’s point of view for next spring, coming to us from a plinth (or three), somewhere in London. “It’s really what modern means in America today, for a 25- to 35-year-old,” said Robinson,“ that’s what we export. Not anything ‘heritage’ or referenced in the past. Today.”

Held in an underground bunker in Bloomsbury, the Gap static presentation—somehow made to appear like a vision of spring sunshine under striplights—was being staged as a public march against yesterday’s announcement of British government cutbacks that was taking place nearby at ground level. As befits the times, the show was nothing ostentatious—that’s never Gap’s thing, anyway—but the fashion focus couldn’t have been more quietly resolute: The company’s creative director sees pants overtaking skirts and dresses for 2011. “It’s a sexy sophistication for seven days a week, not just on the weekend,” he said. “We’ve really worked on that.”

Broken down into its parts, what Robinson sees the world wearing next year is a simple equation of a pair of pants and a top, but with a softness and pale-tinted color sense that shifts the whole look several degrees away from casual. “We have some dresses and skirts,” Robinson said, as a very English ad-hoc dinner party was kicking off behind him. “But somewhere around August or September, I started noticing girls were wearing more pants. So we’re right there with it, building on the foundation of what we already started with the eight pants fits we worked on earlier this year. Even the denim we have for spring is more of a trouser than a five-pocket jean.”

To stay ahead of the denim game, Robinson said there can be no compromises. “I’ve built a new team, based in L.A., so they can be closer to all the wash-houses and generally hang out in the denim world.” What they’ve come up with is a range of softened-blue jeans with a seventies vibe about them, like a flattering high-waisted flare with raised vertical seams in front, and many other dyed denims in pink, dusty coral, and ocher that don’t read “jeans” at all. Specialization in fit and fabric rather than standard generics is the underlying thrust of Gap in the new decade, Robinson said, “You’ve got to be like that when you literally are dressing everybody in the world!” Now that Gap is opening in Italy and China (where the company expects its growth to come from), it needs to please and cater to a global audience. Next summer, you’ll be able to find a more citified look at Gap—pliable tailored jackets to slip over slouchy white wide-leg pants, and drapey, minimal blouses and pocket shirts as easy, but not sloppy, coordinates. Even more “off-duty” pieces like the brushstroke-striped jersey tees with gray sweatshirting sleeves or the A-line khaki canvas drawstring jackets have slightly more of a fashion point of view. Still again, nothing too overt. “It’s closer to the body,” said Robinson, standing back to look at the clusters of young men and women modeling his clothes. “Just what cooler, sexier, younger people want right now.”